A friend like Sappho | Women Poets
Sappho is the literary mother of the poetesses after her and a teacher of love for all of us, both as a literary model and as an inspiration in times of difficulty.
Female Voices - Women Writers to Remember
by Alessia Pizzi
N.1 - September 2022
Gossip Girl
Despite her name is on the lips of many compared to that of many other female colleagues erased by history, the poetess of Lesbos is still a matter for a few today, and often even those few who know her do not have the correct information in their hands.
In Italy Sappho is studied at the Academy and at a particular type of high school centered on the classics. Together with her historical figure - too often identified as a prostitute or lesbian - a mythological figure has been created that portrays her ugly, unhappy and suicidal for a ferryman who did not love her. For this reason I believe that Sappho is not so well known as we might think.
A new life
Only in the 1960s, thanks also to the arrival of Gender Studies, the academic world began to identify Sappho as a poet rather than a woman whose biographical secrets should be discovered. This new light on her production, at the expense of gossip, finally gave her the critical analysis that she deserves.
That’s why a friend like Sappho is useful to all of us, from puberty onwards. A classic, to quote Calvino, has never finished saying what it has to say: what does this phrase mean in her case?
Your new BFF
Sappho was the first to say that the most beautiful thing is what you love. The theorem is simple, straightforward, almost banal. Affirming it at a time when the most beautiful thing was male military prowess, however, is a whole other story!
Some say a host of cavalry, others of infantry, and
others of ships, is the most beautiful thing on the
black earth, but I say it is whatsoever a person loves.
Sappho describes the symptoms of love as if she were a doctor and as if passion were a real pathology. Sometimes it's just like that: we can't control our emotions, we freeze, we make a fool of ourselves, we freak out.
For when I look
at you for a moment, then it is no longer possible for me to speak; my tongue has snapped,1 at once
a subtle fire has stolen beneath my flesh, I see nothing
with my eyes, my ears hum, sweat pours from me, a
trembling seizes me all over, I am greener than grass,
and it seems to me that I am little short of dying.
But all can be endured…
Sappho has another friend to introduce us to: Aphrodite, divine ally in amorous pains. And to that boy (or girl) who didn't like us in high school, we should have dedicated these verses:
Who wrongs you,
Sappho? “If she runs away, soon she shall pursue;
if she does not accept gifts, why, she shall give them
instead; and if she does not love, soon she shall love
even against her will.”
Sappho, the first female Western voice with a strong poetic self-awareness, said:
“I say that one day someone will remember us”.
This verse became the title of my degree thesis on women of antiquity, also inspiring the book I later wrote about them.
Sappho is the literary mother of the poetesses after her and a teacher of love for all of us, both as a literary model and as an inspiration in times of difficulty. Sappho is the woman who was a poet when the term - declined in the feminine - was not even attested in the Greek language.
Sappho is the friend to always carry with you in the critical edition of Franco Ferrari, which I recommend for italian readers. The english version should be “Sappho’s Gift: The Poet and Her Community”.
Hey Google, can I speak to Sappho?
Today it is also possible to converse with the poet: just ask the Google voice assistant. Thanks to the sappho.education project it is now possible to dialogue and chat with the poet on Telegram via a chatbot. For me it was really exciting to try, also because in my book I had already hypothesized that Google would have awakened the poetesses of antiquity.
Unfortunately Sappho speaks only italian at the moment: try to add italian language to your vocal assistant and say:
Posso parlare con la poetessa Saffo?
Let me know if it works leaving a comment below, here’s my video tutorial!
Translation by David A. Campell, Greek Lyric Sappho and Alcaeus (1990)
Part of this article of mine was first published in italian on substack newsletter “Mis(S)conosciute.
Recommended Book
Reading Sappho: Contemporary Approaches. Ellen Greene, Joseph Paxton Presidential Professor of Classics University of Oklahoma Ellen Greene. University of California Press